A Gift
by narwhalloveFF
Summary: Having lost his faith in God and his hope in romantic love, Kurt Wagner is charged with administering a temporary cure on Rogue, new and friendless on the team.


This takes place after Uncanny X-men 204 (1986), during Magneto's first run as head of the X-men. Kurt is years away from learning Mystique is his biological mother.

This fic is mostly dialogue, and served as a way for me to think about Kurt's and Rogue's characters at this time. There's a bit of foreshadowing on Rogue's relationship with Gambit (Remy) at the end.

Many thanks to Ludi, who shepherded me thru my first fic patiently and more kindness than I deserve. ;o)

* * *

It was Dr. MacTaggert's hesitation, and not her "gift," that struck Kurt as she explained its properties. The doctor repeated herself unnecessarily; she would not meet the headmaster's eye; and she addressed Kurt when she should address the headmaster.

The headmaster had summoned Kurt to join him in a video conference call—"As it will be you administering this treatment, not I."

"Administered after the young woman has received extensive counseling, of course," Dr. MacTaggert added hurriedly.

"Of course I will talk it over with her."

"Mr. Lensherr—"

"Please, call me Magnus."

"The young woman has suffered very serious trauma as it is. She may spring on this all too eagerly, and I want her to understand it is brief reprieve at best, and a stopgap at worst. Each dosage lasts four to six hours, and I would recommend against frequent usage. With the professor gone—"

"I will continue my best in assisting her while Xavier is away."

The doctor cast a fervent gaze to Kurt. "I trust the young woman will make the decision best for herself._ You _will make sure of it, won't you?"

Once, Kurt Wagner would have made a speech. He would have thrust out his chest, beamed, and delivered something about how Xavier's faith could not be misplaced; they must all rally in his absence. In his honor. He would've said that he, too, missed the man. Then a joke, a show of his canines, and someone would struggle not to laugh.

He only nodded.

With nothing left to protest, Dr. MacTaggert began describing the nature of the gift.

The young woman was Rogue, and the gift was a cure.

* * *

The professor's absence was hardly the greatest change in the institute. That would be difficult enough. That he would choose as his successor _this man_—the team could hardly believe it. Kitty fled to the company of Doug Ramsay and the other new mutants, and the number of demands for Logan's services had upticked radically in the last few months.

Ororo was hard as nails.

Once, Kurt would have danced with her. Taken her out to the city for a dinner and a show, a "double date" consisting of him, her, and Piotr. Just like the old days.

He didn't have the energy now.

Magnus said something about _practicing_, preparing the treatment, and Kurt had nearly snapped back—_It's just a shot. I don't need to practice giving someone a shot. _

But Magnus sounded tired, his voice dropping into a new rasp, and a prickle of compassion had kept Kurt silent.

As he left the conference room, the new headmaster was on the intercom again, this time summoning Rogue.

* * *

"Is this for real? Is this a trick?"

A ragged white streak, an outstretched fist, and—

Experience in the danger room told him he was quicker than her. He stepped to the side with a gesture that, in his mind, verged on contempt.

Rogue was so American, though. She didn't notice what he noticed, much less what Ororo or Piotr did. If she noticed anything, that was news to him. Right now, she wore a pout.

He said: "I understand you spoke to Dr. MacTaggert and Mr. Lensherr about this all month. No one is fooling you."

As fast as she'd charged him, the young woman sagged.

It was like watching paper burn—she crumpled fast. Dropped her head, clutched her elbows. Even her toes pointed inward.

"Sorry, Kurt. I didn't mean to rush you."

The infirmary was disorderly. Kitty and Ilyana were supposed to tidy and organize, as part of detention for breaking curfew, and hadn't. Kurt was supposed to report this to Magnus, and hadn't. The institute was lining itself up for a cascade failure. Now this cure would neutralize one of their powerhouses. With Logan in Japan and Ororo in Kenya, they'd have to rely on Magnus and Rachel Summers to shore up the mansion defenses.

Kurt moved a cardboard box off one of the examination tables, found a fresh cotton sheet—in the wrong drawer!—to drape, and held his hand out. "Are you ready?"

Under the cold overhead light, her face was pale as milk. "I really am sorry."

"All forgiven. Ready?"

She scooted herself onto the table, shoulders hunched. She reminded him of a cornered cat. "I bet you didn't forgive me. That's all right. Kitty said—"

"What did Kitty say?"

He spoke too sharply, too loudly. She clutched herself tighter. "What I mean is, I'm sorry I'm a bother to you. I could give myself the shot. I've done that before. Momma taught me. Once, in San Francisco, I . . . You know, she worked so hard to try to help me. She interviewed all sorts of government doctors. Moved mountains for me. No one could do it. Now this lady, who doesn't even know me, this lady in Scotland, can help me. How can she help me when Momma can't?"

"The X-men are your family now."

"I can do it myself."

"Nonsense. I can't let you do that."

He'd already turned to the packet Moira had sent—one among the five in a slim aluminum case. The vials were kept at a certain temperature until administration. The formula was dull yellow. Moira had explained it in the conference call. Something about scrambling the dictates of DNA. It sounded dangerous, but she'd been confident Carol Danvers' might would restore Rogue in a matter of hours.

"She has Ms. Marvel to thank. If it weren't for Ms. Marvel's powers, I wouldn't even dream of this,"she'd said.

Magnus was, of course, interested in how the formula might help or hurt other mutants, and Kurt had stopped listening to the video call.

"Please," Rogue said again. "I'd like to do it myself."

Now he looked at her—really looked at her.

Rogue's eyes were so wide they almost bulged, and she appeared drained of blood, so she might faint. She was afraid, just as she'd been the time she came to the mansion. A beaten dog—too afraid to even beg. Still, her hair was beginning to curl at the ends, despite its ragged short cut, and her freckles, thrown across her nose and cheekbones, were the color of hazel.

There was dignity he didn't expect.

"All right. But you know I'm supposed to monitor you for the next six hours. No more exceptions."

The rapidity of her nod eclipsed that dignity. Kurt loaded the syringe. She removed her gloves, rolled up her left sleeve. She did not wear her uniform, but a bright yellow blouse that slipped off one shoulder and sported long sleeves.

Her skin was surprisingly dark for a mutant who covered herself head to toe.

"A gal can sunbathe." She made a halfhearted chuckle, and he was embarrassed to be caught staring.

She let him swab her upper arm, then he passed the syringe to her.

Rogue held it, turned it around and around, then raised her other hand and wept into it.

"Don't cry. Don't cry. We don't even know if it'll work."

She shuddered, swaying once, twice, like a tree in a storm. "Can you—can you give me a minute?"

"I'm sorry. I can't leave you with that, and I can't leave you alone once you've injected it."

It seemed too cruel, and he thought he'd physically hurt her, the way she slumped.

The hand with the syringe trembled, but when it raised the needle, it was firm. Twisted over on herself, the mutant administered her own treatment, she removed the needle, and she held it out for him to throw in the bin.

* * *

Although Magnus was away with the new mutants, he called Kurt precisely on the scheduled hour.

"She says she feels weak. Blood pressure and heart rate a little high, but not unexpected. She's anxious."

"Tell me if anything changes," the headmaster said.

Kitty and Piotr visited Rogue—at distinctly different intervals—but Rogue could hardly speak. She was gracious to Rachel, however, and whispered, "If the elf lets me out, I'll meet you in the boathouse."

Of course he heard this.

At first, Rogue had lain down, concentrating, then complained the table was uncomfortable. She looked at the monitors and asked him what the numbers meant.

"I feel a little dizzy, mainly, if I turn my head quick."

She hopped off the table, then buckled.

"I feel sick!" And then she'd thrown up.

At this moment Kurt wondered why they'd not flown to Muir Island. Why wasn't Moira here? Who had decided any of this was wise? He wasn't a doctor.

Back onto the table, a mop and bucket.

She was crying again. Little sobs, covering her face.

Kurt opened one of the cots. The infirmary was a disgrace, he realized now. The new mansion had been hastily constructed; what equipment he'd ordered was purely intended for emergencies. He'd intended to order the "nice" effects later. But he'd been distracted.

He wondered what Kitty had told her. About Amanda, no doubt. Amanda's absence could not have gone unnoticed. During a foolish, drunk night, he'd told Piotr of the breakup. In a mansion like this . . . Surely people were relieved, relieved as they'd been horrified to discover he and Amanda grew up together as siblings.

_Gross, _Kitty's face had said.

It didn't matter he was adopted, that no other mother would have kept him. It was, for them, simply _gross. _Everything was gross. How lucky to be able to declare anything gross! What comfortable ground to stand on!

For Kurt, everything had been hard earned, even Amanda's love.

"Here's a bed," he said, over Rogue's sobs. "Do you want to lie down on something softer?"

"I can't get up."

"Try."

Rogue swung out one leg, then the other. She pushed up with her hands, and pitched to the side. The foot that touched the ground didn't know what to do. Her head lolled.

Kurt slipped an arm under her. She folded into him like a child, surprising him with the hard coil of her body, the nearly vicious dig of her fingers into his shoulder.

"Oh god. I'm pathetic. I should be able to get up, right? I did it before I met Ms. Marvel."

"Probably you have relied so long on your mutant abilities that you are unused to not having them. Dr. MacTaggert said this might happen."

He laid her down on the cot, and covered her in another sheet so she didn't seem so vulnerable.

* * *

"I'm sorry I'm not there," said Moira. "I'm on my way to New York now. Jamie had written Rogue down for the tenth instead of today. I didn't realize it until Mr. Lensherr called me. If you run into any real problems, Dr. McCoy will see her."

"Why isn't he here _now_?"

"The Avengers keep him so busy."

It wasn't fair to blame her, he knew. It was his own fault for not paying attention; Magnus clearly thought him far more capable than he actually was, and, well, he would kill Jamie Madrox next time they met.

"Her DNA will reassert itself fairly soon. She may suffer in the meantime, but she won't be damaged in any lasting way," said the doctor.

* * *

The woman on the cot didn't care.

"Is my suffering _unimportant_?"

"Are you in pain?"

"No. But—but I don't feel _good. _Usually, I'm so peppy I feel like I can run through a brick wall."

"Well, you can. And most people can't."

Her face looked like a white plate with two coals for eyes. He'd covered her with all the sheets he could find because she claimed she was cold. Still, she shook.

"Rogue. It's been two hours. Your numbers are normal. Even your heartrate is normal now. Exceptionally good resting rate. I think . . ."

"Yes?"

"I think you're just worried. And I know you can be brave."

"Worried! _Just!_" she exclaimed. "What if that doctor just gave me a virus? How do we know she's not trying to kill me?"

"We've been though this already. Moira is the professor's most trusted—"

"How do we know this works?"

"Can you fly?"

Her feeble upward thrusts amused him.

"Damn. Damn," she kept saying.

She was too tired to go on. Kurt wondered if Kitty could phase a television set into the infirmary.

Then Rogue said: "Kurt—I messed up earlier. I know about you and Amanda. Kitty told me. I'm real sad for you. I know you must miss her. Or, uh, feel bad about it. I'm sorry I brought her up. Maybe you're still hurting. Either way, I'm sorry you had to do it. I'm sure it was for good reason."

Kurt laughed.

It surprised him to laugh.

"Everyone knows."

"Kitty told me Ilyana told her."

"Who did you tell?"

"Rachel already knew."

He laughed again.

She sat up on one elbow, almost plaintively. "You were real playful when I first met you. I mean, after a while. You tickled me once. You wouldn't do that now."

Heat rose to his face. That had been not long after Rogue arrived, when he and Piotr were horseplaying by the lake. He'd concocted a wild theory that Rogue had gained Carol Danvers' seventh sense and tested it—rudely.

"I'm sorry. I never apologized for that. Piotr and I talked it over and I felt very foolish about that. I _was _a fool. I'm trying not to be one now."

"I liked it." She was blushing. "I mean, I was angry then. Real angry. But I liked it, too."

He didn't know what this meant.

"You weren't scared of me," she said.

"_You _weren't scared of _me_."

"How could I be? I wanted—so badly—for you all to like me. And besides." The flush intensified. Her brow was red and now her neck, too. "Besides, you look like Momma."

He must have flinched because she amended, fast: "Momma isn't all bad, you know. She was so kind to me. She and Irene were everything to me, once. She loves me. Not everyone can say that of their mother, can they?"

"You're feeling stronger," he replied. "You are sitting up now."

* * *

Kurt did not want to think about Mystique. With her cruel face and heavy voice, both deep and shrill at the same time. Her dark, almost royal blue skin. Darker than his fur, but strikingly, strikingly like his own.

The Beast was blue, but it was clear to anyone's eye—Kurt assumed—that the fur and color were of a different order from his own. The way a cat's pelt differed from a deer's. The way the light passed: Beast's hair was lightweight, plush, and stood up straight. Kurt's was dense, short, sometimes with a crimp if he woke up funny. Saturated. Dark.

The darkness of Mystique blue was the same. If she could grow fur, it would be like his.

Later he had catalogued their differences: she moved upright, tailless, with all the usual limitations of the biped. Red hair—outlandish hair, if he could judge anyone for appearing outlandish. Her personal power. No one would meet Mystique and think her wilting, powerless. She did not live a life of apology.

Yet the first time he'd glimpsed her, he had stared at her, and she at him, and there was a recognition, an immediate understanding. For a moment. A wonderful, horrible understanding.

* * *

Her daughter wanted to try standing, wanted to try flying again.

With his assistance, she did the first, jerkily. Then she made several bunny hops.

"I can't! Okay, I'm going to pick up the table."

"How about this folding chair?"

She couldn't lift the folding chair.

"Kurt, a _normal _woman can lift that, right? Even Kitty could do it. What's the goddamn point if I can't be a _normal _woman?"

"Dr. MacTaggert will perfect the formula."

They walked together around the infirmary, his left arm looped around her waist as she hung on to his left shoulder. Her steps were sure—mostly.

"Whatsit you call Kitty? Kätzchen?"

"Yes. It means little cat. Though she's already little."

"You sure like her, huh?"

"We all do."

"Ro adores her. Kitty can't fuck up in her eyes. Everything Kitty does is golden."

"You've worked very hard. You're valuable to the team. Logan spoke highly—"

She coiled up again. "Don't! Don't! That's just embarrassing. I don't want to hear it. I know I've been useful, I've been helpful. But nobody's _nice _to me. And Kitty told me you're the nicest one. I thought, if Kurt's the nice one, I've got a snowball's chance in hell with everybody else."

"Rogue, have you thought that if you can't fly or lift this chair, this means the formula's working?"

"Fuck this chair! Fuck flying!" she said to the floor. She was crying again. "I miss the professor."

She pitched forward, head dipping down by her knees. Quick, Kurt reached under her knees and swung her up against his chest. Amazing she couldn't walk on her own—she was a tight ball of muscle.

"Hey, not so hard. This is an ordinary shirt," he said, plucking at the claw of her hand.

Face, slick with tears, suddenly lunging near his. "Kurt? Can you do it?"

"Do what?"

"See if I can—you know."

If the mutant known as Nightcrawler could stop time now, he would have.

In this moment, in this one conversation, he was not _the _freak.

For the rest of his relationship with Rogue, as foes or friends or colleagues, he would not be the freak. Despite her awkward prettiness and noisome behavior. One day she might bloom, might become a real beauty, at ease with herself and her body. But she would still be, inexorably, the freak. He pitied her.

She had been raised by a mutant as strange-looking as himself. She had come to the Xavier institute with humility and stayed on with plucky courage.

He didn't wish to face her—it was really too much to look at all that earnestness—but he did. Her tears all ran into her mouth, which usually bore a sulky expression. She wasn't sulky now.

Kurt kissed her.

He'd seen Carol Danvers' body, thin and wasting away. He'd seen mutants made limp and silent in a way that chilled the men of the team. Something disturbing in how one gawky girl voided the potency of her victims.

It was a slow, deep kiss. Her mouth was soft and already open. She didn't smell like Amanda, she didn't kiss like Amanda. Rogue smelled like excessively sweet perfume and the tang of vomit. She kissed precisely like who she smelled like—an inexperienced girl. At first, her tongue met his boldly, then she let him kiss her. It occurred to him he was kissing _her _and not the other way around.

But her hands swam up to his face and hair, her knees, both tucked by his right shoulder, clutched him. She rocked against him with a rhythm that—

"Ow, ow!"

It was Rogue who whimpered, not him. When he leaned back, he tasted blood.

He'd nicked her with one fang. A thin line on her lower lip.

"Sorry!" He set her on her feet, and she nearly tore his shirt trying to hang on. "The treatment works!"

"Are you sure? You don't feel faint?" she queried.

Surely, surely there was a rule about kissing one's patients. "I feel fine, and if _you're _hurt, then surely . . ."

Rogue still on to his arm, her knees folding, and he settled her into the nearest piece of furniture—the folding chair.

Her fingertips flew up to her bloodied lower lip. "That was nice," she said. "That was so nice."

* * *

Kurt beelined to the monitors, in a pretense of checking her numbers.

Why wasn't anyone here? Didn't anyone care about her enough to visit?

Of course not, that was what she'd been saying this whole time.

His sweatpants were tented. The kiss _had _been very nice. Oh, he always wanted women, _always_—it was a joke to himself that he'd been designed to desire as deeply as he repulsed—and now the freak was grateful.

He refused to look at her, where she sat, unmoving.

Then her voice, so low it was guttural.

"What a gift you have, to disappear, Kurt. I wish I could do that. Even when_ they're_ with me, when they're _in _me, I'm still right there. I wish it were like possession. I touch someone, and _zap, _they take over my body. But I gotta be there, with them, and sometimes it's not so easy to stay on top of them. Usually I can do it. But sometimes . . . the fight's not over, even if their bodies are on the ground.

"I know you think you're an outcast, because you look the way you do. But, god, if you could hear how they talk about you. Your friends. They would lay their lives for you. They don't even hafta say it. Kitty's dying to talk to you about Amanda, but she's scared of hurting your feelings. Logan drank an extra beer in your honor after you left early the other night . . . You don't even have to disappear, and yet you can!"

He was loud, discordant. "You're wrong. I don't disappear. Wherever I go, I'm there, too."

"Oh, Kurt!"

"Listen. You can touch anyone now. People won't be scared of you. If you want, you can meet Rachel in the boathouse."

But this didn't please her. He could feel her pity, hot as a spotlight on his head, and he hated her for it.

* * *

Rachel found a spare wheelchair to help convey her, but Rogue insisted on walking, if slowly, against her shoulder, all the way to the boathouse.

He trailed them by about ten steps, checking his wristwatch, waiting for the hour of the formula's expiration and the reassertion of Rogue's powers.

When it came, Rogue slowly rose from the wooden pier.

Higher and higher, until her black figure and shock of white hair drifted over the rippling lake. Higher and higher until he shielded his eyes from the blazing afternoon sky, and he felt he was witnessing a miracle.

* * *

A thump and bang—so loud Kurt sprang to his feet.

Nightfall. Tired from the sun, he had gone to bed unusually early. Rachel said she would watch Rogue and field the hourly phone calls from the headmaster. Relieved, he'd tumbled to sleep, and now a voice called him.

"Please, help."

_Amanda!_ and he darted forward to the door, tripping over his sheets. A pillow tumbled to the floor.

"Help—I have to sit."

The fragrance was familiar, and cloying: a child's idea of perfume. He didn't know where to bring Rogue. The light from the hallway was dim, his night vision excellent, but in his confusion, he carried her straight to his rumpled bed.

"What's the matter? Are you ill?"

"No. Close the door, Kurt. Please."

Obediently, he did. Moonlight and starlight poured in from his adjoining windows, and Rogue was a white shape on his bed. The novelty of her sight, her scent made the room a new place.

"Check my pulse."

He snatched up her wrist. No glove, no sleeve to hide her skin. Her pulse rapid, not dangerous. Skin cool as glass.

"What happened? Is it a recurrence?"

Moira had said nothing of a recurrence—only that the dose might lose potency earlier than expected.

"You were right. It's easier the second time. I got to the elevator okay. It's a long walk from the elevator to your room."

"Rogue—you dosed yourself!"

She shook from the exertion of sitting up on one hand. "I made it up here, didn't I? And I'm all right."

Suddenly he understood why she'd come.

"Is this pity? Are you here to pity me?"

"No!"

"I was unfriendly all day. I was rude to you."

"Not when you kissed me."

He was going to protest, say something of her self-respect, that this wouldn't be her only opportunity to be with a man. That he didn't need her _humanity_, thank you very much.

Instead he was hot. He perched on the footboard. "I hurt you when I kissed you."

"Kurt, I know that you're nice. I don't need Kitty to know that. Be nice to me. You can be mean tomorrow. But be nice now."

Her eyes glistened in the starlight. He could see her clearly, clearer than she could see him, and he realized she didn't know that. She thought her face was as hidden from him as his was from her.

"I won't be mean, I promise."

"Everyone says that."

"Rogue . . ."

"I want to be here with you now."

She nearly jumped when his tail touched her.

He supposed there was little possibility he would have refused her. She was _here_. She had chosen _him_. Whatever he'd imagined he felt kissing her in the infirmary . . . wasn't imagined.

It circled her foot and then her calf. Both cool as glass. Kurt landed lightly onto the mattress, resting on his toes and fingertips, and she jumped again.

His tail slid up her thigh, looping her tightly.

"It's smooth. I didn't know that," she said, in a high voice.

Slid under the elastic of her underwear. A sigh rose out of her. He slinked forward, hand over hand, and leaned over her, watched her face.

Rogue bit her lower lip; she appeared in distress but for those rising sighs. He caressed her again and again. Silky, wet. From here he could smell her, the deep scent. Different from Amanda. Completely different.

When she arched her back, her breath faster, his tail slipped away, up to her face.

Without prompting, she turned her head, opened her mouth, and sucked the point of his tail. Sucked the taste of her right off.

She laughed an awkward little laugh. "Was that kinky? That was, huh?"

"Miss Rogue," he managed to say, "I'm afraid I'm very kinky."

* * *

But first she wanted to look at him.

Afraid she would change her mind, Kurt rushed to open the curtains for the moonlight, haul off his pajamas and present himself to her.

Her hands wandered over him, his neck, shoulders, chest, knees.

His fur lay very close to his body, swirling with the line of his muscles; he trembled to be examined so closely, so explicitly. The deep valley between his pectorals, the nipples nearly ultramarine, down to the softer belly, where the hair gathered and began to curl.

Rogue touched less like a woman and more like a child discovering a novelty. "How many women have you been with?"

"Lovers? A few."

"How many?"

Embarrassed, he said, "Six."

"That's a lot for someone who looks like you."

She'd actually said it. Out in the open. This pleased him.

"My only romance was with Amanda. The others were . . . curious." Men and women alike—kindly, but nevertheless curious. "And you? How many for you?"

"Gosh. Two. I guess. Neighborhood boys. No one special."

He didn't believe her, but he was too distracted—her hands were bolder now; she leaned forward and squeezed his cock in a way that confirmed her experience.

"Does that feel nice?"

"Very."

He was alive to that still-extraordinary sensation of being _among _freaks. He guided her hand, he could have been happy if she did _just _that; he hadn't known how badly he needed this.

She wriggled out of her nightgown, an unnecessarily complex contraption, he wished to help but felt too shy to—her breasts were lovelier than he expected; pert and heavy, and then she struggled out of her underwear. "There. I'm ready." She laughed. "I can't remember the last time I took everything off for somebody besides myself."

"You're very beautiful."

"So are you."

She kissed him as she hadn't in the infirmary. She kissed to consume, to devour, arms around his neck. When she lifted her knees, gliding them up his flanks, he gripped one thigh hard and leaned it on his shoulder.

"The fur—" she laughed. "It's so nice." She was gliding her other leg up and down his flank, and he lowered his mouth.

Nicking her again, in his haste, her nipples and her breasts. She hissed with each wayward cut of his fangs, but kept pushing him back down. The farther he descended the richer her scent, the less he thought he could wait.

"Rogue, is this your first—"

"Keep going. Please keep going!"

She cradled his head. The mansion was half-empty. Kurt was glad for it.

* * *

"I don't believe in God anymore," he said suddenly.

The moon had set.

Beside him, Rogue stirred, the gentle bedtime stirring that reminded him of Amanda—so sharply that he was overcome with gratitude.

"What's that you say, sugah?"

"After the Beyonder arrived and showed us . . . things I never imagined God could do, I realized I couldn't believe in God. Not when beings like _him _exist."

She made a sound of sympathy, of animal understanding. Kurt wanted to press his face into her jagged hair, breathe that sympathy in.

They loved each other. Now they loved each other. It had to be.

Not the love of eros. Tonight was a strange occurrence: she needed something, he provided. It was an act of friendship. Of communion.

"I never thought about God," she said.

They lay with several inches between them, her scent permeating everything. For days he would smell her body in this room, in his pillows, even in the rug.

"When you flew today—you looked like an angel."

"Did I?"

"You're so used to it you don't realize it's a miracle. You can fly."

A laugh. "It ain't a miracle, Kurt. It's a crime. What I did was a crime. It's like a woman killing another woman for her diamonds. She looks good wearing them, but those diamonds mark her. She's a sinner."

After a spell of silence, in which he didn't know what to say, he raised her bare hand and kissed it.

* * *

They had sex again. Stronger, more mobile now, she was fierce. Kurt thought she burned like stained glass, like hammered gold. A lightning strike.

Sweaty, spent, she'd slumped up against his side, and when he wanted still more, she squeezed his hand _yes. _

Later, in a tangle of arms, legs, and tail, which she draped over her closed eyes, he asked her: "Who are you looking for? In a man."

A smile quivered on her mouth. "You first, Kurt."

"I don't know. I thought Amanda would be everything. She _is _everything. To someone. But not to me anymore. What about you? Is there someone in the institute you like?"

"Here? No. I know what kind of man I want, though."

She seemed too shy to carry on. Too shy, after all they'd done!

"You don't have to tell me."

When he thought she fell asleep, she finally said:

"A man who sees me and sees a woman. Not a criminal. Not a mutant. A man who can look me in the eye. You know—I don't think Piotr can bear facing me. Me being on the team is a hardship for him. Logan can. Logan does, after Japan. But I had to work _hard_ for it. Work hard for someone to look me in the eye. Know that I'm capable of doing nice things, even though . . ." She waved her hand. In the dark, it moved like seagrass in a current.

"I'm your friend," Kurt said.

For the second time that day, she cried. A silent warbling. He huddled around her, tightly. "I've been unkind. Forgive me. Forgive me."

She trembled so violently that he kept babbling.

"Kitty told you I was the kind one, and I haven't been. I've been uncharitable. I've been . . . perhaps I don't deserve to believe in a God."

This made her laugh. She struggled out of his grip and wiped her tears with large, rough gestures.

"I'd like to be swept off my feet. Someone dashing would be nice."

He wanted her to lie down again. He wanted her to stay till the morning. To oversee her health—and to be near her.

"Prince Charming?"

"Yeah. I'm ready to be romanced. I don't want to be this way all the time."

"You mean, resorting to someone like me?"

Rogue dropped back onto her side, drew her knees up to her chest, defensively. When he slipped an arm over her, she let him. Slowly, she relaxed again.

"I like that you look like a mutant. I _love _that about you. I don't want a man who can pass. I want a man like _me_. Fucked, you know? Doomed to be a mutant. Wherever he goes, everybody knows who he is. And he doesn't care."

She blew out a deep, shaky breath. "I want him to be proud of who he is."


End file.
